Introduction

I would like to introduce you to my hero, the ap tanky carry mummy of doom! The goal of this guide is to introduce an extremely bursty and effective build for amumu. This build works extremely well, and in my opinion is easily the strongest way to build Amumu. I have built amumu quite a few ways, and no matter what, I keep coming back to this build simply because it is better than other amumu builds. I've had people tell me I am stupid to build this way, or I am not tanky enough. These people don't know what they're talking about. Amumu has some of the best ap ratios in the game, skills which are 1.0, 1.0, .5, and .01% max health in dmg per 1 ap. Not only does he have insanely good ap ratios, but all 4 of his abilities do damage. The better question is, why wouldn't you build him with at least some AP in mind?

As of now, I am a 1750 elo player who uses amumu as his main. My win ratio is something like 60%, and of late I have been winning 80% of my games on amumu. I fully expect to hit 1800 in the near future, and it will be because of this build. Enjoy the guide, and good luck!

Summoner Spells

There are, in my opinion, only 3 viable summoner spells for jungle amumu.

Smite is a summoner spell every jungler should have, and for amumu it is a requirement. I'm not sure amumu could even jungle without it.

Flash is a nice summoner spell for amumu, but it is often not needed when trying to initiate. Bandage toss can often get the job done, but if not, Flash can definitely do the job for you.

Ghost can be very strong on amumu. Because he wants to stay with his targets, if you feel you will be doing a lot of chasing or running in the game, this is the summoner spell for you.

I would argue that none of the other summoner spells are that worthwhile on amumu. Possibly Ignite if no one has it and the enemy team has like a vlad or mundo, but even then I don't like it.

Deciding between Ghost or Flash. During character selection look to see what type of heroes the enemy team has. If they are bursty, mobile heroes (like leblanc, ahri, tryndamere, ect), or have a lot of cc, then flash is probably what you want. If they are sustained damage heroes (like mundo, gp, nasus, ect) and don't have a ton of cc then ghost is what you want. Pay attention to the enemy team here, because that decides what summoners you should get.

Runes

Runes

Greater Mark of Magic Penetration9

Greater Seal of Armor9

Greater Glyph of Magic Resist9

Greater Quintessence of Movement Speed2

Greater Quintessence of Ability Power1

Greater mark of insight is the only rune I would use in the marks category for amumu. Nothing else is as good as this mark, period.

I would not use any other seal on Amumu. He needs the armor badly for jungling, and missing out on this will not be good.

There are a few glyphs I would be open to in this spot. That being said, I really like the greater glyph of warding because amumu is weakest early, and if he doesn't have enough tank he won't be able to use his abilities effectively. One could also get MR per lvl runes. Up to preference.

Amumu needs to stay with his target. He can just follow the enemy and let Despair slowly kill them, hitting Tantrum periodically. Movement speed can't be underestimated.

This lets Amumu jungle faster and pack a bit more of a punch on ganks. You could probably use 2 of these and 1 quintessence of swiftness. Honestly, up to preference :).

The thing to note from these is quite a bit of the focus is on tank. Even though Amumu is a mana hog, I don't pick up mana regen runes. They aren't that useful, seeing as he burns it really fast unless he has blue buff. So yea, for start of the game your goal is to be hard to kill so you can be useful to your team.

Creeping / Jungling

This shows the starting route you always want to go on Amumu (if you are not counter jungled). Start at wolves [1], and make sure to ask for help from your teammates. Wolves are a challenge for amumu at level 1, and you don't want to take too much damage. From there, take blue[2] and then run to wraiths[3]. After that, run back to wolves [4]. The time should be right around 2:45, and if wolves haven't spawned when you get there they will spawn within the next five seconds. Kill wolves, and if all has gone well you will be level 3.

This is where things get interesting. At level three you should have gotten bandage toss, and you are ready to try for a quick gank. Look at the three lanes, and whichever one looks most promising for a gank, go ahead and walk over to it. Make sure to ask your lane mates if a ward is up, especially at bottom. Sometimes you will want to gank from the lane instead of going from the river. Very rarely, I also level Tantrum at 3 if I see no gank opportunities available.

When ganking, the most important thing by far is to hit your bandage toss. If you catch someone out of position, you can run in and Despair/ Tantrum, and then if they create some space you can bandage toss for the gap closer and the stun. That being said, don't necessarily expect to get a successful gank. Amumu is a solid ganker, but at those levels a kill is never guaranteed.

If the gank fails, or if the enemy is not out of position, go back to farming the jungle. You should at this point kill wolves/wraiths again, and then go for red buff. At this level, you should avoid golems. You take too much damage and use too much mana killing them. You should only kill them if you have no chance at a gank and there are no other creeps up in the jungle. Keep farming the jungle, and be on the lookout for another chance to gank the enemy team. If you chose to start with Regrowth Pendant, you will want to go to base to get a Philosopher's Stone when you have 715 gold. This will allow you to finish boots and philosophers stone. If you decided to start boots and 3 pots, you will ideally want to go back to town at 950 gold. This will allow you to purchase 2x Doran's Ring. There are only certain conditions you want to go philo stone.

[1]You don't expect to have issues with the enemy jungler. Philo stone makes amumu extremely weak early and prone to counterjungling.
[2]You are planning for late game and have a team around you that can support you until then.

Three more things to note about jungling; once you hit level 6, you should be looking at the lanes with full intention of ganking. You now have 2 cc abilities and some decent damage. Your goal at this stage of the game is to kill an enemy hero. Also, amumu is very weak against dragon. You should not try to kill dragon unless you have a minimum of 3, and probably 4, people helping you. The last thing is that amumu is not strong against most jungle heroes.

Team fighting on Amumu

When trying to team fight on Amumu, you should have multiple goals. The first is to make sure when you go in that your team is following you. By this, I mean make sure your team is ready to go. I have gone in multiple times, but because of no followup my ultimate was pretty much wasted and we lost the battle badly. If your team is prepared to go in, you are much more likely to win the fight.

The second goal in team fights is to hit your ultimate on as many people as possible! If that means you have to wait a few seconds to ult, that is fine. Your goal should be to catch between 3 and 5 people in your ultimate. If you do that, then you are doing a good job.

Beyond these two things, there are a lot of things to think about when going into the team fight. Do I want to bandage toss whoever I can, or am I specifically trying to hit the AD? Often it doesn't matter who you bandage toss to get into the fray, as long as you move to the proper target after the fighting has started. You also want to try to focus on a high threat target. Remember, hitting the target once at high lvls will lower their magic resist by 35, meaning everything you do will hurt them more. Also, with an amumu with this kind of ap build, he can pretty much take out an ad if he targets them.

Once you have initiated, you want to spam your tantrum and keep your despair on as many people as possible. When bandage toss goes off cd, try to hit a high threat target with it. If you do, they will likely be dead. If you get targeted by the enemy team, pop Zhonya's and laugh in their faces. After that goes away, continue to liberally apply dmg to everyone near you.

Generally speaking, the enemy group will split up and you will need to chase them. Luckily for you, you have a super high dmg nuke and gap closer in bandage toss, and will have little trouble chasing them down and killing them. Finish off a hero, then go about your business of doing baron or taking a tower.

That is generally the way you want things to go, and it often works that way as well. One thing to watch out for is a hero that can disable you before you can get your cc off. If there is something like that, try to hit your ult right when you get in the thick of things, or you may be stuck taking a beating while you are stunned or silenced. Otherwise, not too much else to it. Remember, coordinate with your team!

Masteries

Masteries

3/2

2/2

4/1

3/3

1/1

1/3

3/3

3/1

1/1

3/3

1/1

4/3

1/3

Why go this build? Once again, back to early game tank. Amumu needs the tank. Second, cdr. The best cdr reduction is in the tank tree, and it is handy for amumu. Third, move speed. Amumu needs move speed to stay with his targets, or he is 100% useless. Fourth, Runic Affinity is very useful for amumu. He needs blue buff for as long as he can have it, and with this mastery he is able to use it to his fullest potential. It may be possible to do something like 9/21, but I strongly recommend putting 21 into the defensive tree.

ABILITY ONE (Q): (Active): Amumu tosses a sticky bandage in a straight line. If it contacts an enemy, Amumu will pull himself to it, dealing magic damage and stunning the target for 1 second.

Range: 1,100

Cost: 80 / 90 / 100 / 110 / 120 mana

Cooldown: 16 / 14 / 12 / 10 / 8 seconds

Magic Damage: 80 / 140 / 200 / 260 / 320 (+1.0 per ability power)

You must make sure to hit this if you can. The easiest way to hit bandage toss is when the enemy is running away from you. So if you can spook them and get them to run, it can sometimes be easier to hit bandage toss. That being said, people often try to evade and bandage toss isn't the easiest skill to hit. If the player isn't juking, it is possible to lead the player and hit with the skill.

ABILITY TWO (W): (Toggle): While toggled on, Amumu will be surrounded by a small damaging area of tears. Enemies in the area will be dealt a percentage of their maximum health plus a base amount as magic damage each second.

Don't underestimate this skill. Make sure to have it on at all times when you are fighting other players. If ap gets high enough, it is not unreasonable to hit for 8-9% of a heroes max hp per second. All that being said, the skill is not hard to use.

(Active): Amumu will make an instantaneous tantrum, dealing magic damage to surrounding units. Additionally, each time Amumu is hit by an autoattack the cooldown on Tantrum's active will be reduced by 0.5 seconds.

Cost: 50 mana
Radius of AoE: 200

Physical Damage Reduction: 2 / 4 / 6 / 8 / 10

Cooldown: 10 / 9 / 8 / 7 / 6 seconds

Magic Damage: 75 / 100 / 125 / 150 / 175 (+0.5 per ability power)

The best way to use this skill is to get in a position where you are getting hit by a lot of weak attacks (so creeps). It is possible to cast this skill every 2 seconds, if not faster, depending how many creeps are hitting you. The range on this ability is short, but just try to spam it when it is on cd, because it comes up very quickly, especially in the press of team fights.

This skill has a very large radius. It is possible to hit a hero from very far away, and you should use this to your advantage. Say you are next to an enemy, ganking them, and they flash. Use Curse of the Sad Mummy right away, and it will hit them. This will allow you to close the distance once more and hit with despair and tantrum some more. Beyond that, in team fights, try to ult 3-5 players, and then run to the biggest threat and start whaling on them. Lastly, don't use the ultimate on single heroes unless it is early game or you feel you will get a huge advantage by doing it.

Items

Now to the juicy part of the guide, items. For quite a while I played Amumu using things like Frozen Heart and Force of Nature. These made me quite tanky, one sad, hard to kill yordle which did miniscule amounts of damage. I then came to the realization that these do nothing for my team. Yes, I am a bit harder to kill. But fact is, I am initiating one way or another. I might as well pump up my damage so the enemy is devastated from my spells. So here is my item guide, each item examined and explained.

Doran's Ring has become my new early game item of choice on Amumu. Since Amumu is so weak early, getting something that has very beneficial stats is great. Compare 2x Doran's Ring to 1x philosopher's stone. Dorans gives 160 hp, 10 mp5, and 30 ap. Philo stone gives 18 hp5, 8 mp5, and gp5. Without a doubt, Dorans makes you a ton stronger early game than philo stone will, where doran's is 950 gold and philo is 800 gold. Doran's gives you slightly more mp5 as well. The downside of doran's is late game, you will have more money from philo stone than from buying the 2 doran's. My counter to that statement is that ap amumu is a GREAT farmer - he doesn't need the extra gold because he farms so incredibly well late game. Also, if amumu can do better early (like not dying or getting a kill he would have missed out on), he makes up for not having the philo stone. I strongly recommend 2x doran's rings instead of philo stone on amumu.

philosopher's stone philosopher's stone is often built first for a few reasons. Amumu needs some sustain early, and because of that starting Regrowth Pendant is a solid choice. After that, it is a simple thing to finish up the philosopher's stone. Once Amumu has had it for 27 minutes, it literally pays for itself (not including selling it to the vendor). It is often worth having because it is so cheap to get it after you got regrowth pendant. That being said, I find this item to be weaker than early game doran's rings.

This item is useful, but expensive for boots. I don't necessarily always get it. The key thing when choosing boots, and I generally only choose Mercury's Treads, Ninja Tabi, or Sorcerer's Shoes is to look at the other team as well as yourself. If I am ahead - say I got an early gank and am jungling well, I should probably do Sorcerer's Shoes. If I am not ahead and if the other team has quite a few ap heroes (2 or more), then I will go Mercury's Treads. If the enemy team has 3-4 high damage ad heroes I will go Ninja Tabi. You need to think carefully before choosing the boots, because it can greatly impact your ability to survive mid game.

Sorcerer's shoes are very useful if you are slightly ahead and you want more damage. With the updated build using dorans instead of philo stone, you can afford to get these because of the increased health pool amumu has from the dorans.

I would not pick any other shoes besides these three on amumu, period.

Abyssal Scepter is an extremely powerful item, not only for amumu but for your whole team. It gives amumu that tank he craves for, that ap, and also increased magic penetration for everyone on his team. This item can be very strong with the right team comp. Beyond that, I consider this a core item on ap amumu because 99% of the time your team will have at least 1 other ap, and it also makes him hit harder than any other item for the cost while giving him some survivability vs ap burst dmg.

Zhonya's Hourglass is, in my opinion, another core item for ap amumu. This item gives a sizable chunk of ap, some armor, and most importantly it's use ability. Being able to initiate a team fight with Bandage Toss, Curse of the Sad Mummy, Tantrum, and then zhonya's while your Despair is ticking away at the enemy team and they are vainly trying to kill you is amazing. Once zhonya's wears off, you are now able to keep working on the enemy team. Even if 1-2 are focusing you, it doesn't matter. You have very solid tank and should be able to handle the damage fine.

So that ends my core item build on amumu. The goal of the core items is to give high ap while maximizing tank. Both zhonya's (armor), and abyssal (magic armor) give you survivability beyond just ap dmg. With this core you have quite a tanky hero which can dish out dmg and become immune to dmg w/ the zhonya's use ability.

After this point, you have a few options.

For those amumu feeling like they want MORE DAMAGE, well here is your fix. Rabadon's Deathcap gives you a massive boost to your damage output. After your core and getting this item, amumu could have around 450 ap, meaning your ult hits for a whopping 800 dmg, and Bandage Toss hits for about the same. Despair is hitting for 6-7% of everyone's life every second, and Tantrum can aoe for 400ish damage. Rabadon's is the item that changes amumu from an ap offtank to an ap carry. Amumu hits like a mack truck, and if people don't get out the way they will get steamrolled.

Once again, if your team is ap heavy you can go with Will of the Ancients. This item is extremely good for amumu, and once against it increases amumu's ability to survive and tank damage. At this point amumu hits hard, and because often amumu is hitting multiple targets with his abilities, Will of the Ancients keeps him alive and kicking.

Guardian Angel is great if you feel zhonya's just isn't enough and you are getting heavily focused in team fights. By the time we get to this point in the game, everyone knows who's doing all the damage. Teams will stop ignoring you and will begin to focus you. To counteract that, you can get guardian angel. This makes amumu that much harder to take out, helping him do more dmg to the enemy while giving your team more time to kill. Sometimes I will get this item before wota. It just depends on the situation.

Rylai's Crystal Scepter This is a good option if you're not dying in teamfights but want to be able to keep up with your opponents. It does three very nice things for amumu. First, it gives amumu a large chunk of hp. This makes him that much harder to kill. Second, it gives amumu's abilities a slow. This removes your issues of staying with other players. Lastly, it gives a nice ap boost to increase amumu's damage. Overall a very solid item on ap amumu.

Void Staff could be a good replacement for wota or rabadon's, say if you need some magic penetration. I haven't picked it up very often on amumu, but I could see why it would be a great late game item. The real issue is it doesn't add any to survivability and probably won't add as much damage as Rabadon's Deathcap. Also, you already have quite a few things reducing the base magic resist of the opponent. If I remember right, void staff will only work after the base MR reductions, meaning it is less effective.

Thornmail could be handy if you are up against a very high dmg ad hero. That being said, I don't generally like to get it because with amumu's burst he can pretty much drop an ad hero instantly if he can get close. Plus, hourglass is a life saver, so why get thornmail? But, all that being said it might be good in some situations.

Mejai's Soulstealer is a great ap item, and because amumu is quite tanky and difficult to kill, it is definitely worth considering if you are doing really well. That being said, it is always a risk to buy this item. Get at your own risk, and get it early if you plan on it. Also, don't forget that amumu has no easy way to escape a fight.

Rod of Ages is an item I have never bought on amumu. Yes, it does add tank, very similar to that of rylai's. The bigger issue I have with this item is it does nothing that rylai's can't do (and rylai's isn't part of my main build either). The only reason I would say this might be attractive is if you feel you want more mana on amumu. But with all of the amazing items amumu can get, I just feel like this one lacks anything that makes it stand out as a great item for him. I've heard some posters talk about how they use RoA quite often on amumu. I get why you do, seeing as you get a huge chunk of mana. But late game amumu doesn't need mana, and the slow on rylai's is better than the increased mana. And as for hp/ap, it is pretty much identical between RoA and Rylai's. So yea, not a bad item for amumu, but rylai's is better.

Banshee's Veil is an okay item for amumu. It gives some decent survivability. The spell shield isn't really all that important on it though, seeing as you are the tank and will be absorbing a lot of spells anyways. As long as you get your ult off, you are doing your initial job. The magic resist and hp is nice, but I would argue that something like a will of the ancients would give you more dmg and more survivability (or at least as much as) banshees veil. This is because with your aoe damage you can steal a lot of hp. The main reason to get this is if you try to initiate and are having trouble w/ something like a soraka silencing you so you can't initiate properly. Otherwise there are better items.

Frozen Heart is actually a pretty good item on amumu. It gives him a lot of great things. The armor is always handy vs ad, and so is the 20% as slow. The extra mana doesn't hurt and will allow you to fight longer without needing blue buff. The cdr is mainly only handy for your bandage toss, though. Tantrum is massively reduced cdr by just being in a fight, and despair has like no cd. Your ult has a long cd but you will only be using it once per fight anyways, so that is not a huge concern. All that being said, it really comes down to preference. Do you want to be a bit more tanky with a bit more utility, or do you want to output more dmg? I have used frozen heart quite a bit on amumu, and though it isn't bad I feel going ap items w/ a tanky focus are better.

Force of Nature This is another good tanky item on amumu. It gives him sustain with the hp regen and if there are some farmed ap on the other team gives him some serious magic resist. The move speed is also good. So yea, a solid tanky item. But once again, it comes down to preference. Would you prefer to be a bit tankier or do you prefer to do more dmg? After using FoN quite often with amumu, my conclusion is I prefer to have more ap dmg to take people out faster. To compare, this item is pretty comparable to Abyssal Scepter. Abyssal gives less magic resist and no movement speed, but you get a good amount of ap and a group buff which benefits the whole team, and not just amumu.

Lich Bane is a very interesting item that I have been thinking about lately. It gives amumu a lot of the things he wants - 80 ap, 7% move speed, some mana, 30 magic resist, and a nice passive which will be used (since amumu wants to hit the enemy to debuff them too). The conundrum I have with lich bane is that I want rabadon's before I get this item so that it can be very effective. At the same time, since lich bane gives almost no survivability (30 mr), I find it hard to stomach picking up both rabadon's and lich bane. If you pick both of them up, then I would assume that means you are replacing guardian angel or wota. Either way, I feel it will make amumu too squishy to be able to effectively use lich bane. The only other option is to drop rabadon's instead. This will decrease your ap by about 150-250. Considering that you only get an on hit effect in compensation I can't see it being worth it. So then, we consider dropping wota. More testing is needed, but I think the only way to use lich bane on amumu is to replace wota with it.

Randuin's Omen I am adding this because I think it is a very viable alternative to Guardian Angel as a last item for amumu. This gives you a very good way to deal with AD carries (reducing their attack speed AND slowing them). At end game, amumu's combined magic resist and armor should be about 400, meaning the use ability will last for 5 seconds. On top of that, the increase armor and hp is great. Just in general a solid item for amumu.

Important notes about amumu

In this section I wanted to give some hints and tricks for people playing amumu to help them out.

Tips on playing amumu

Hit your bandage toss. It is essential to be good with bandage toss, or your effectiveness on amumu will plummet. Often I will see people do funky juking moves to avoid the toss. Be patient and wait until the enemy gets to the desperation point where they need to just get away. Once they do, hit em.

When fighting red/blue buffs, you can move away from the small creeps so your aoe doesn't hit them and it will refresh tantrum more quickly.

In the middle of a team fight, make sure to use Bandage Toss when it comes off cooldown. It hits extremely hard.

Getting hit by creeps while fighting an enemy will increase amumu's damage, because he will be able to use tantrum more often. You want to be hit by creeps when fighting enemies.

If you have wota and good ap and haven't ulted yet, you can wait till about half life and ult. This will drain a ton of hp.

If you are tower diving and don't want to get hit by the tower, using zhonya's will switch tower aggro to someone else.

Amumu's passive only works if he hits his target. Make sure to hit your target periodically to keep amumu's passive up on them. Also, hitting before you tantrum can increase your dmg by a bit.

Thanks to JhoiJhoi for her guide to creating a guide on mobafire. I would have finished this A LOT more slowly without her guide :D.

If there are any thoughts, comments, or input on this guide please let me know. I have only worked on it for a few hours, so hopefully I will be able to get more information (like a few videos of me playing amumu), for you guys. Please up vote if you like the guide and let me know what you think!

Some photos of games I've played following this build

A hard fought game. You really get to see the power of AP Amumu in this video. This is a full game and is a bit long for sure.

This is a player who used my guide and won 9 in a row w/ amumu! Thanks s4mpp for the submission.

League of Legends is a team based, real time strategy game set in a mythical world of swords & magic where epic battles decide the fate of mystical nations. Game players take on the role of a Summoner who conjures and controls champions to fight for them at the Institute of War. During game play champions gain experience and items to enhance their skills and abilities. How players develop and play their champions can be the difference between a crushing defeat or a glorious victory!